


A Natural Perspective

by Quokkasandnothingelse



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: A one-shot in four parts, Adult Number Five | The Boy, Alternate Universe - No Sparrow Academy (Umbrella Academy), Ben is still dead (sorry), But it's okay because he and his emo fringe live on in our hearts, F/M, Five is a grumpy old man - but also a cinnamon roll, Fluff and Angst, I mean I don't view it that way but just in case, Implied Sexual Content, Number Five in his teenage body, Post-Season/Series 02, Pseudo-Incest, Reginald Hargreeves' A+ Parenting, Season 2 Alternate Ending, Vanya Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Vanya is an awkward cinnamon roll, fiveya - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:36:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25885207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quokkasandnothingelse/pseuds/Quokkasandnothingelse
Summary: When Vanya runs into a random Commission Agent in a beat-up diner in lower Manhattan, she has no idea that he's not as much of a stranger as she thinks is.Five, however, knows better.(aka Vanya runs into a past 30-year-old Five, and the present 58-year-old Five in his 13-year-old body has to deal with it... because time travel is the best, if confusing, matchmaker)
Relationships: Allison Hargreeves & Vanya Hargreeves, Klaus Hargreeves & Vanya Hargreeves, Number Five | The Boy/Vanya Hargreeves, Vanya Hargreeves & Everyone
Comments: 118
Kudos: 548





	1. Overture

**Author's Note:**

> **Housekeeping!**  
>  So I finished the second season of TUA and swore to myself that I would show restraint and not immediately start thinking of fanfic because I have other fics that I do not spend enough time on, as well as friends and a life that I also do not spend enough time on.
> 
> As you can see, that plan did not go so well. 
> 
> 1\. This fic features Five in both his 30-year-old body and in his teenage body (because angst is a pain that reminds us that we're alive). 
> 
> 2\. In case you've somehow missed the tags, I just wanna take the time again to emphasise that this is a **Five/Vanya fic** and there's nothing ambiguously platonic about it. If that's not your cup of tea, cool, buuuuut you probably won't enjoy this. 
> 
> 3\. You also probably won't enjoy this fic if you like/support Donald Trump for reasons that will probably become very clear in the first chapter ~~look usually I stay out of American politics online but your election is stressing me out, pls get it together~~.
> 
> 4\. I'm English - that's why I spell things like that.

Vanya Hargreeves knows pain.

When she had been younger, she had suffered the pain of being an outsider, of being constantly reminded that in a house full of children with amazing abilities, _she_ was the only ordinary one. In theory, being the only different child should have made her special; in reality, it made her useless. While her siblings had risked their lives fighting dangerous criminals and saving people, she had stayed home, practising her violin. Her music had echoed around the cavernous halls of the Hargreeves Mansion, only emphasising the absence of an audience to her life. It had been a long, drawn-out pain that had burrowed deep inside her and stayed there, even after she had moved out. 

However, that pain had been nothing compared to when she had stopped taking her supposed anxiety medication and realised that she was _far_ from ordinary. This pain had been raw and fresh, and left her struggling to breathe, as if someone had plunged a jagged knife directly into her chest and _twisted_. Since the pills had been numbing her emotions as well as her powers, there had been absolutely no escape from the resulting, overwhelming agony of it all - it was a living death. 

But even that pain had seemed trivial in comparison to the pain brought on by using her powers. It was as if her old childhood pain hadn't been lying dormant inside her, but smouldering, waiting for the right spark, and her powers had provided the perfect fuse. Except, rather than a release, every burst of power had only resulted in more pain. When she had almost killed her sister. When she _had_ killed Leonard. And Pogo, their father's chimpanzee assistant. And Grace, their robot mother. When she had destroyed their childhood home. When she had almost brought about the end of all her siblings and the entire fucking world along with them. All of the pain had compounded in on itself, feeding into the agony that fuelled her powers in a vicious cycle that had only grown bigger and more out of her control. 

Vanya had stood on the stage of the Icarus Theatre, her family held suspended in the air above her as she slowly ripped reality apart around them, aware that her pain was slowly killing them as well as herself yet unable to stop it. 

Being so powerful yet so helpless had been a pain above all others. 

However, Klaus jabbing her in the eye with a mascara wand comes pretty close. 

"Ow!" she yelps. He's sitting in her lap, pinning her arms beneath his bony thighs in an attempt to keep her still, but she still tries to jerk her head away from him as much as possible. 

"Well, if you quit _squirming_ so much and stayed still!" he reprimands her, flicking her in the forehead. 

"If I stay still, you'll _blind_ me!" Vanya protests. Klaus rolls his eyes.

"Vanya, Vanya, Vanya - where is the trust?" he demands. Vanya opens her mouth, ready to tell him _exactly_ where the trust has gone with detailed examples as to why. "It was a rhetorical question!" Klaus says quickly, before she can speak. "Now, sit still or I'll get Allison to rumour you." He pushes her head firmly against the back of the chair and leans over her again, his tongue sticking out his mouth in concentration as he drags the mascara wand across her eyelashes in painstakingly slow motions. 

"I should've blown you up when I had the chance," Vanya mutters, but it's an empty threat and they both know it. 

After her siblings had stopped her from ending the world, they had ended up trapped in the early 1960s, scattered at various points in time between 1960 and 1963. While that might be extremely frustrating for most people, it had arguably been the best thing that could have happened to the Hargreeves siblings in terms of repairing their family bond. 

Vanya, Klaus and Allison had undoubtedly been the most successful in building a halfway functional family dynamic, and for the first time in Vanya's life, it feels completely natural to consider the pair of them her brother and sister. 

The sister in question is also in the room, sitting at Klaus' vanity table and doing her own make-up with considerably more ease. Technically, the vanity table is Vanya's, but after Klaus had expanded his room by knocking through the wall that had separated her room from his, everything in her room had become his by extension. 

He had since apologised profusely to Vanya for this and offered on multiple occasions to share the room if she ever wanted to move back in. Vanya had appreciated the apology and thanked him for his offer. But while she wouldn't mind moving closer to her family, she has little desire to move back into the Mansion again: its halls are filled with the echoes of too many painful memories for her to ever feel completely at home. Then Allison had asked her if she wanted to find a new place together, since she had also moved back to New York and been similarly unwilling to live in the Hargreeves Mansion for the long term. It had not taken Vanya very long to make up her mind. 

Out of the corner of her free eye, Vanya watches Allison coat her lips in a dark red lipstick that perfectly suits her bold smile, before swivelling gracefully in her chair to face them. 

She's smiling more and more these days, something that Vanya is both extremely relieved about and endlessly grateful for. 

_Don't mess up the timeline_. That had been their brother Five's main concern when they had finally all met up in 1963. 

But of course, they had. 

When they had first arrived back in 2019, they had thought that they had got away with it. The moon didn't have a hole blown through it, the Russians hadn't invaded, and (thankfully) their adoptive father, Reginald Hargreeves, was still dead. As an added bonus, the Mansion was still standing and bearing no sign that it had ever been ripped to pieces. 

But every action has a consequence, and their consequences had been borne solely by Allison. 

Vanya will never be able to forget the night that Allison had found out her daughter Claire had never been born. She had screamed and bellowed so loudly and for so long that it Vanya had thought that she would bring the walls of the Mansion crumbling down around them by the power of her voice alone. Luther had held onto her tightly, gently rocking her, but it had done little to soothe her. 

"I heard a rumour that Claire was here!" she had howled over and over again, barely stopping to breathe in-between. 

But as powerful as Allison is, her powers don't work that way; she can't conjure anything into existence. And so, Claire had stayed gone and Allison had stayed heartbroken. 

Vanya knows that Allison's pain will scar and become easier to live with - but she also knows that it will never fully go away. 

"Don't worry Vanya, I'm sure Klaus has an eyepatch you can borrow if he pokes out your eye," Allison tells her, smirking. 

"If that's a Jack Sparrow reference, then I want you to know that I'm insulted but far too busy to think of a witty retort right now," Klaus responds. 

"Wouldn't an eyepatch be a little out of place at one of these events?" Vanya asks. The event in question is a charity fundraiser, with all money raised going to sponsoring arts education programmes for underprivileged kids. If anyone other than Allison had asked her to go, she probably would have said no; these events tend to be far too loud and dramatic for her taste, attended by rich people looking to feel good about themselves and hiding barbed jabs under surface-level compliments. But she knows Allison is trying to transfer her acting career from film in LA to Broadway in New York, and that rubbing shoulders with the theatre industry elite is an extremely smart way to do that. 

After losing Claire, Allison deserves to have something to go right for her - and what sort of sister would Vanya be if she didn't support that? 

"Considering the place is going to be full of mobsters, I imagine you'd blend right in," Klaus mutters under his breath so only Vanya can hear. 

The man hosting the event is Ronald Stump, CEO of Stump Industries. He's a billionaire and real estate tycoon who apparently has a soft spot for the arts, as he owns almost every single theatre in the city. 

He's also a renowned mob boss. 

"Nahh, they'll just think that you're an eccentric artist," Allison says to Vanya, waving away her concerns with a dismissive hand. "You should know, being a musician and all." 

"I've only just made first chair, it's not like I'm regularly drinking champagne with the musical directors," Vanya points out. A dull ache has set in her neck from the prolonged headlock that Klaus has her in, and the eye being held open is starting to water madly. 

"Well, consider this good practice then," Allison says, winking at her. Vanya tries to wink back, but ends up clumsily blinking, her eyelid jerking out from underneath Klaus' thumb, releasing a single, fat tear that runs down her cheek.

"For fuck's sake!" Klaus snaps. "You know what? Move again. I fucking _dare_ you!" he challenges her, brandishing the mascara wand perilously close to her eye.

"Alright, I'm sorry! But shouldn't you be done by now anyway?" Vanya demands. Klaus sighs, his shoulders heaving dramatically. 

"I cannot work under these fucking conditions. Fine, yes, here." He adds a final dot of mascara that Vanya can't imagine makes a lot of difference and clambers off her. Vanya near moans in relief, stretching her neck from side to side and flexing her fingers as the blood rushes back to her arms. She forgets all about her discomfort, however, when she sees herself in the mirror. 

Considering the amount of time Klaus has spent putting make-up on her, she's surprised to see that while she does look different, her face isn't as alien as she had imagined it would be. Her complexion is still pale yet more even, her cheekbones highlighted by the faintest tint of blush. Her eyebrows are so full and even that they may as well have been tattooed on, and for all the trouble the mascara has caused her, it really does make her eyes pop. She turns to Klaus, who's grinning at her expression. 

"This is amazing, Klaus," she says, sincerely. "Thank you." 

"Ah don't thank me yet - we've still got the hair and dress to go," he tells her, briskly. "Now then." He touches his fingers lightly together and observes her critically over the top of them, like a professor judging his student's science project. "What do we think Allison? Hair up or hair down?"

"Hmm," Allison says, coming over to join him. "Maybe down? With a slight curl?" 

"I like the way you think," Klaus nods. "What if we gather it all on this side?" He pulls her hair carelessly over her face to demonstrate, ignoring her splutters as some of it goes in her mouth.

"Ooh, great idea! It'll show off some collar bone," Allison says, clapping her hands together in excitement. 

"Do I get a say in this?" Vanya demands, though she doesn't really mind; she's dreamed of being included in Klaus and Allison's beauty sessions like this ever since she was a kid. 

"No way," Allison says. 

"Absolutely not," Klaus agrees, grabbing a hair straightener off the floor. "Right. Now, you're _really_ going to want to sit still for this," he tells her, snapping the tool ominously. 

**xXx**

Around an hour later, Allison and Klaus finally deem her finished and Vanya is allowed to leave. She's never been poked and pulled - and in one instance _burnt_ \- so much before and somehow come out looking better. It had taken all three of them to wrestle her into an asymmetric bodycon dress in a black, leathery material that falls to just below her knees. As good as it looks, it does make breathing slightly uncomfortable - though Vanya suspects that that's an inevitable side effect of the dress' ability to take a couple of inches off her waist, while pushing her boobs as high up her chest as they can possibly go. Both Allison and Vanya had been extremely interested in finding out why Klaus just happened to have a dress in Vanya's size, but he had turned pink and refused to say. 

As versatile as Klaus' wardrobe is, they could not find any shoes in it that fit Vanya, so she's borrowing a pair from Allison. They are slightly too big for her, but Klaus has strapped them on tightly enough that she can at least walk without fear of them flying off her feet. All the same, Vanya is not used to wearing such high heels, even ones that fit perfectly, and teeters so precariously down the stairs that Klaus has to keep a tight grip on her arm all the way down. 

As someone who lives in skinny jeans and oversized shirts, this outfit is something that she never would have trusted herself to put together. But she _does_ trust Klaus and Allison, so she allows herself to relax and not overthink it, safe in the knowledge that she is, as Klaus had put it, "super smoking hot". 

Allison springs down the stairs ahead of them, bouncing effortlessly in her own stilettos. The light catches the glitter of her golden dress, reflecting back on her tawny skin so she just seems to sparkle from head to toe. Allison may have the power to make anyone do whatever she wants, but in Vanya's opinion, her ability to run in heels and still look as good as she does is her real superpower. 

"I'm going to go and get a cab!" she trills at them, before disappearing out the front door. 

"Cool, I guess I'll wait here," Vanya says. She makes a beeline for the nearest chair - but Klaus' pull on her arm stops her from sitting down. 

"Oh no," he says. "You can't just sneak out without showing off my artwork!" 

"Klaus, you did my hair, make-up and put me in a dress... I don't know if that counts as art," Vanya tells him, impatiently. 

"But Vanny, don't you see? I did so much _more_ than that!" Klaus whines. "I have transformed you from a shy, awkward caterpillar into the strong, hot-as-fuck butterfly that you were always meant to be! _I was your cocoon_!" 

"Right, but Klaus, I'm kinda struggling to walk here," Vanya says, keen to steer the conversation away from cocooning. "And since this butterfly doesn't have wings, I'm gonna wait in this chair." 

She tries to sound stern enough that he realises she's serious and actually listens to her. However, Klaus either doesn't pick up on her tone or ignores it, as he promptly bends down and throws her over his shoulder. 

For such a skinny guy, he's surprisingly strong and he carries her into the living room with relative ease, his shoulder digging painfully into her abdomen. 

"Presenting Miss Vanya Hargreeves!" he declares, before dumping her unceremoniously on the sofa. Luther and Diego turn to look at them, their faces already set in the weary expressions reserved solely for Klaus' eccentricities - before blinking in surprise as they take in Vanya's appearance. 

"Vanya!" Luther says. "Uh... you look different - I mean, nice!" 

"Not bad!" Diego agrees. "You scrub up well." 

As far as responses go, they're about as bland as they come - but they mean a lot to Vanya anyway. Before the 1960s, her relationships with Luther and Diego had probably been the worst out of all her siblings. Luther's solution when he found out she had powers had been to lock her in a soundproof chamber under the Mansion, an action that had finally tipped her powers over from "destructive" to "apocalyptic", and Diego had wanted nothing to do with her ever since she had published her autobiography detailing her experiences in the Umbrella Academy. 

When they had been stuck in the 1960s, Luther had sought her out to apologise. Vanya had been suffering from amnesia at the time, and hadn't understood the significance of his words. But she does now.

She hadn't shared any such heart-to-hearts with Diego, but just before they left, she had found him sitting on the steps of a farmhouse porch. Vanya had sat down next to him and tentatively rested her head on his shoulder. Rather than shrug her off, he had rested his head against hers in turn, and an unspoken understanding had passed between them.

Her relationship with her brothers still isn't perfect - but it's a million times better than what it had been before. 

However, Klaus is far from satisfied with their less than enthusiastic response. 

"Not bad? _Not bad_?" he demands, as if Diego has hurled some great insult at him. "I'll have you know that blood, sweat and tears went into creating this!" 

"Yeah, _my_ blood, sweat and tears," Vanya reminds him. Diego snorts while Klaus huffs, but before he can retort, there's the sound of the front door opening and Allison appears.

"Cab's outside!" she announces. "Come on Vanya!" 

"Allison!" Luther says, swallowing visibly. "You... uh... you look..."

"I think you broke him," Klaus says in a mock whisper, before abruptly ducking as Luther aims a light swat at him that probably would've still sent him flying through the wall. Allison rolls her eyes and ignores the exchange, pulling Vanya to her feet. 

"You ready?" she asks, encouragingly. 

"As I'll ever be," Vanya replies. She's starting to feel a little nervous, but Allison takes her hand and gives it a reassuring squeeze before leading her out the room. 

"Remember to be home before midnight!" Klaus calls after them. 

"Goodbye Klaus!" 

"Don't let anyone touch you up by the buffet table!" 

"Good _bye_ Klaus!" 

"But if you _do_ have to sleep with anyone to get a part, remember to use protection!"

"Diego, can you please...?" Allison yells. There's a soft thump followed by a muffled squawk, presumably from Diego throwing a cushion at Klaus' face with his usual pinpoint accuracy. Vanya giggles, some of the tension releasing from her body. 

They cross paths with their other brother Five in the hallway, coming from the kitchen with a cup of coffee in one hand and a book in the other. 

Growing up, Five had been the only sibling to pay any attention to Vanya. Whenever one of them had entered the room or they had passed each other in the hallway, he would make a point of acknowledging her, smiling and saying her name loudly, even if it meant pausing whatever he had been doing - and especially if Reginald had been nearby. Vanya had known that his actions were more about rebelling against their father, who had encouraged the children to exclude her as much as possible, rather than actually caring about her... but she had been so desperate for contact with her siblings that she had drunk it up all the same. 

She can't pinpoint exactly when it had moved beyond annoying Reginald, but it had. He would start seeking her out: jumping into her room to complain about their siblings, stealing snacks to share with her at midnight, including her in his time-travel theories, and trying to explain the various equations that he scribbled on his walls, no matter how many times Pogo painted over them. He would tease her, not maliciously like the others, but gently, crowing with delight whenever he succeeded in making her blush behind her curtain of hair and declaring that he could read her "like an open book". Vanya would always insist that he was wrong, but they had both known that it was true; he did know her better than anyone else. She had suspected that she knew him pretty well too, though she would never dare say that to him. More than once, she had been practising the violin and noticed him silently watching her in the doorway, a fresh bruise on his face or blood splatter on his white shirt from whatever mission they had just returned from. She wouldn't acknowledge him, but smoothly transition from whatever piece she was playing to one of his favourites: Corelli or Vieuxtemps, comforting him without words.

Vanya isn't sure if she had considered Five her _brother_ , but he had been her friend. At one point, she had even thought he would be her first kiss.

She had been struggling with Sibelius' Violin Concerto in D Minor, a notoriously difficult piece of music, especially for a thirteen-year-old. She had practised until the tips of her fingers were bloody, but this still had not been enough to satisfy Reginald, who had berated her at the top of his lungs for her failures both as violinist and a member of the Umbrella Academy. Utterly humiliated and overwhelmed by the pressure to be extraordinary at _something_ , Vanya had cracked. Grace had given her extra doses of her pills to calm her down, which had left her unable to do anything but lie on her bed, staring aimlessly at the wall.

Five hadn't said anything when he had found her, his eyebrows knitted together in a deep frown as he took in her helpless state, and Vanya had fully expected him to leave. Instead, he had gently taken hold of her and had jumped them both to the roof. He had sat them both down and, in an uncharacteristic display of affection, had hesitantly placed his around her shoulders, letting her lean against him. She could hear his heart thud in his chest from where her ear was pressed against his jumper and had wondered if hers was beating just as loudly. 

They had stayed that way for a while, silently watching the sky change from a tangerine orange to a smokey purple as the sun slowly disappeared behind the tall skyscrapers that cut into the horizon. Vanya had tilted her head upwards to say something and found that he was looking down at her, an expression on his face that she had never seen before. Tentatively, he had pushed her blunt fringe, already overdue for a trim, out of her eyes and leant down towards her. 

Vanya's breathing had shallowed so much that she might have stopped breathing all together, her eyes closing in anticipation. 

But he hadn't kissed her. Instead, he had just pressed his forehead against hers, his skin cool and soothing. Neither of them had spoken - neither of them had had to, their thoughts slipping between their heads easily. 

A few days later, he had disappeared and Vanya hadn't seen him again for sixteen years, until he had suddenly crashed out of the sky, looking exactly the same as she remembered him but with the mind of a fifty-eight year old, yelling about an impending apocalypse. 

Now that they have safely averted not just one but _two_ apocalypses, and with no third apocalypse in sight, Five seems to have redirected all his efforts into ageing up out of the thirteen-year-old body he's stuck in. Any efforts of his siblings to get him to take a break are either ignored or scathingly dismissed, and it seems strange to Vanya that for someone with the ability to go anywhere at any time, Five's existence has become confined to his room, the coffee maker in the kitchen, and travelling between the two. 

"See you later Five!" Allison calls, pointedly. Five grunts in acknowledgement without looking up from his page, the printed word almost illegible under his scrawled notes. A part of Vanya wants to stay and convince him to stop and rest, at least for an hour or two... But that conversation would take much longer than she has time for, even without Allison firmly tugging on her hand. She allows herself to be pulled out the door, throwing a final look over her shoulder at Five as he jumps out of the hallway. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I found out that Allison in the comics actually _could_ use her powers to summon things into existence, but in the TV show they gave her more limitations - which tbh I don't mind at all as I think it leads to more interesting character development and choices rather than "rumour ex machina".
> 
> [Song inspiration for this chapter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANFamim4SbY)


	2. Act I

For an event comprising of eccentric artists and potential mobsters, it's pretty much as dry as Vanya could have hoped for. Even Ronald Stump himself is a less than impressive figure. Despite being one of the richest men in New York, his appearance is surprisingly shabby. His suit is cheap and ill-fitting, complemented by a patchy tan and a limp wig that looks as unhappy to be on his head as he is to be wearing it. Even his voice is uninspiring: thin and reedy, it's the sort of voice that would struggle to command an army of kittens, let alone a business empire. Vanya isn't an actress, but she tries to hide her disgust as best she can when he catches her hand in his own sweaty, palm and presses a surprisingly wet kiss to it with his thin, dry lips. Luckily, he's soon swept away by other men in suits, and Vanya and Allison make a swift escape to the bar. 

For the most part of the evening, Vanya's role is pretty easy. She smiles when she's introduced and then hangs back to allow Allison to work her charm. There's a lot of laughing at jokes that aren't particularly funny, showing interest in ideas that aren't particularly innovative, and flirting with people who aren't particularly attractive. Yet, despite all that, Vanya finds herself enjoying playing the part of a sophisticated woman who attends events like this all the time and has a whole wardrobe dedicated to shiny, pretty dresses. She even manages to master walking in her heels without stumbling, even if she can be outpaced by a tortoise. However, by the time the event ends at midnight, her feet have begun to throb uncomfortably and there's a noticeable ache in her cheeks from the incessant smiling, and she's more than ready to call it a night. '

So, when Allison says that a few people are thinking of heading to a nearby bar for drinks and asks if Vanya would like to join, she gently but firmly refuses. 

"Are you sure?" Allison asks. "Do you want me to come with you?" 

"No, it's fine. You go," Vanya insists. "I think I'm gonna head home, shove my feet in an ice bucket and sleep." Allison seems a little apprehensive, but accepts her response and gives her a hug. 

"Thank you so much for coming with me," she says. "Remember we have that apartment viewing at two tomorrow." 

"I'll be there," Vanya assures her. "Have a fun night!" 

"Text me when you get home!" Allison calls after her. Vanya waves in agreement and weaves her way through the crowd of people to the exit. It's still early for a Friday night, but she's in the financial district of Lower Manhattan, and the streets are silent except for the occasional car and the satisfying clicks of her heels as she walks. 

She rounds a corner and walks another couple of blocks, keeping a lookout for any cabs. Before she spots one, however, she passes a singular diner, sandwiched between two imposing skyscrapers. It has a strong 60s vibe, and looks shabby and out of place among the glass facades and sharp angles of the surrounding buildings, yet simultaneously as if it is right where it belongs, the sole constant in an maze of evolving architecture. 

Her stomach rumbles a little. The food at the event had been delicious but small, as is typical for food at expensive functions, and even if there had been lots, she had felt far too conscious of the tightness of her dress to eat more than a couple of mouthfuls. As much as she can't wait to take her shoes off, the idea of a big, greasy burger is just tempting enough to convince her to wait a little longer. 

She casts one last look down the street to check for any cabs and, seeing none, pushes the door open. 

"Booths are closed, hon," the waitress says, by way of greeting. "But you can sit at the bar or one of the small tables." Two of the three tables are already occupied: one by a man with a receding hairline in a threadbare suit, staring at the black screen of his dead phone, and one by a woman with a thin face in a long cardigan, chewing anxiously on her nails. The third table is directly next to the door to the bathrooms. 

"Thanks," Vanya says, pulling up a stool at the bar, near sighing with relief as she takes the weight off her feet. The waitress sets a slightly chipped, white mug in front of her and pours coffee into it without asking. Vanya wraps her hands around it and inhales deeply. She wonders how many cups of coffee Five has drunk since they left and hopes that Luther, Klaus and Diego have been able to force him to take a break - but she doubts it. 

She orders a plain cheeseburger and glances around her. There's only one other person at the bar, sitting a few seats away from her. He looks to be about her age, with a straight nose and dark, floppy hair combed over to one side. Despite that, there's a weariness about him that she doesn't often see in people their age, and his pale skin almost has a sallow undertone to it - though that may be due to the diner's overhead, yellowish lighting. 

He's wearing a simple black suit: black blazer, black trouser, black tie, white shirt. Maybe he's coming from a funeral? That would explain a lot. He has a book open in front of him and is annotating the margins with a black fountain pen. The waitress tops up his coffee, and he doesn't look up before immediately reaching out for it. 

However, it's the thick, black briefcase on the floor by his feet that really catches Vanya's attention. 

Personally, Vanya has only encountered the Temps Commission, an organisation responsible for maintaining the space-time continuum, once before. They had sent a whole army of agents to attack her and her siblings under the orders of the Handler. It had been much easier than Vanya feels comfortable admitting to herself for her to blow them all away. 

She thinks that they are currently on good terms with the Commission, especially since the Handler was killed by the Swedish assassin. But she's heard enough about them from Five and Diego to immediately be on her guard. Besides, time travel is a tricky thing, and there's no way of knowing whether this agent comes from a time when the Commission is their ally. 

She shifts in her chair. She should call the Mansion and let her siblings know. She can already hear Five's irritation at being dragged away from his work as he curtly tells her that the agent is probably just here doing Commission business and is nothing to do with them. All the same...

Vanya takes a gulp of coffee and tries to channel Allison's confidence. What's the point of having powers if you can't take risks when you need to? 

"Good book?" she asks. The man doesn't respond, doesn't even pause in his writing. Vanya frowns and continues, a little louder. "It's been ages since I enjoyed a book that much. In fact, I think it's been ages since I even picked up a book -"

She stops as the man abruptly closes the book with a snap and pointedly tucks it away inside an inner pocket of his blazer. Vanya feels her face heat up with embarrassment - but then she realises what the book is. 

_Extra-Ordinary: My Life as Number Seven_. 

Her book. 

Alarm bells instantly sound in Vanya's head. Why else would a Commission agent have her book if he wasn't here for them? Maybe it's too late and she's already walked into a trap. The coffee in her cup begins to bubble and spit, and the lights start to flicker, humming softly as the air comes alive with electricity. Vanya takes a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down. 

She's been training with the others ever since they got back, and while she feels more comfortable with her powers, she would be lying if she said that they don't still scare her a little. Still, in some ways, the burst of power is reassuring - a reminder that she can handle one lone Commission agent. Or at least, hold him off long enough to make it back to the others. 

The man is drinking his coffee, staring pointedly ahead of him. Reminding herself that she has no reason to feel threatened, she tries again. 

"I'm surprised you find the time to do reading. I wouldn't think you were _commissioned_ for that." The man freezes and she smiles, satisfied. "Then again, with a briefcase like that, I'm sure you have enough room to carry several books around," she continues. 

As bold as she's being, her heart beats a little quicker as he finally turns to look at her. His eyes are tired and surprisingly sad, shrouded under thick eyebrows, yet there's no flicker of recognition or sign of smug acknowledgement in them. 

"I'm not sure I know what you mean," he says, coldly. Vanya folds her arms and wonders if acting lessons are a mandatory part of Commission training. 

"Yes, you do," she insists. The man gets up and picks up his briefcase, and for a brief moment, Vanya worries that she's got everything horribly wrong, that he's not a Commission agent, just a man on his way back from a wake or a business trip who just wants to enjoy a cup of coffee in peace after a long day of travelling. 

But he just moves a couple of chairs down towards her, sliding his coffee cup along the bar with him. He's quite a bit taller than she is. That in itself isn't unusual, most people are taller than Vanya, even Five in his current body, but it's yet another reminder of how out of her depth she feels. He sits down next to her, putting his briefcase back down under his feet. He smells of stale coffee and bourbon, and Vanya can make out the five o'clock shadow forming along his jaw. He leans in and she tenses, the power coiling in her chest like a tightly wound spring. 

"How do you know the Commission?" he asks. His words are casual, but his gaze is intense, cataloguing every blink, every rise and fall of her chest, watching for the slightest hint of a lie. She resists the urge to move away. 

"We've crossed paths a couple of times," she says, trying to sound evasive enough that she doesn't give too much away, yet definite enough to not invite further questions. He sees through it, though. 

"They tried to kill you," he says. "So, why are you still here?" 

"I guess they decided I was more trouble than I was worth," she says, carefully. _More like Five was more trouble than they were willing to deal with_ , she thinks. He's hard enough to live with at the best of times - she can't imagine how it would be to have him as a disgruntled ex-employee. 

"Huh," is all the man says. 

"How about you?" Vanya asks, hastily trying to move the conversation away from herself. "How did you end up at the Commission?" 

"None of your business," he snaps. Vanya blinks. 

"Sorry, I thought this was how conversation works," she says, dryly. "You ask me something and I answer. Then I ask you something and you answer." 

"Well that was your mistake," he returns. Vanya rolls her eyes, making no effort to hide her exasperation. He may be in his thirties, but he has the attitude of a grumpy old man. Luckily, she has more than enough experience in dealing with grumpy old men - no matter how young they look. 

The waitress sets her burger in front of her, and Vanya digs in readily, humming appreciatively as the cheese explodes in her mouth, and ignoring the sauce that spills out over her fingers. She's so wrapped up in the burger that it takes her a while to notice that he's staring at her. Part of her feels a little self-conscious of the messy way she's eating - the other part is concerned that any second now, he'll realise that she's the woman from his book. But than again, even she struggles to recognise herself in the thin, ghost-like woman staring out from the back cover... even when Klaus hasn't worked his magic on her.

He waits until she's finished and has cleaned herself up with a napkin before speaking again. 

"Who are you?" 

"You first," Vanya says. His eyebrows shoot into his hairline at this, but Vanya doesn't back down, meeting his gaze evenly. She's a quick study, and she's learnt her lesson. 

"Quentin," he says, eventually. 

"I'm Va-" she stops. Just because he hasn't recognised her so far doesn't meant that he won't connect the dots the second she tells him her name. Vanya is a fairly unusual name, particularly outside of Russia. Even in Russia, "Vanya" is the diminutive form of "Ivan" and therefore not common among women. "-iola," she finishes. "I'm Viola." 

"Viola," he mutters to himself, rolling the name around his mouth as if seeing how it tastes. " _One face, one voice, one habit and two persons_." 

" _A natural perspective that is and is not_ ," Vanya finishes. "Twelfth Night."

"I was wondering if your parents were Shakespeare enthusiasts or music fanatics," he drawls, though Vanya thinks she can detect the faintest hint of admiration behind his carefully layered expression. For a moment, she's confused. 

"Oh?" she frowns. "Oh! Because of my name! Viola. Yeah, I don't think my dad really cared enough to name me after something he loved... he just thought it was important that we learn Shakespeare. I do play the violin though." 

"You do?" he leans forward again, interest piqued. "Any good?" 

"I'm alright," Vanya shrugs. "For a while I thought it was the only thing I was good at - and I was mediocre even at that." 

"And now?" he prompts. Vanya gnaws on her bottom lip, considering. 

"Now I know better," she says, eventually. He nods approvingly, pulling a flask out of an inner blazer pocket and pouring some golden liquid first into his coffee cup and then hers. At least now she knows where the bourbon smell comes from. 

"To knowing better," he says, raising his cup. She clinks it with her own and waits for him to take a large gulp before doing the same. The drink is surprisingly smooth with a hot kick to it, and she can feel it travelling down her throat into her stomach, the comfortable warmth spreading throughout her body. She's aware that she is once again telling him a lot about herself when all he's told her is his name. Then again, isn't there something to humanising yourself to assassins so that killing you becomes that much harder? 

"You remind me of someone I know," he says. "She also thought she was insignificant." 

"Was she?" 

"If there's one thing working for the Commission has taught me, it's that no one is insignificant," he says, firmly. "But I never saw her that way anyway. I hope that she came to the same realisation you did." 

A buzz from her phone distracts her. She fishes it out of her pocket and is surprised to find that she has a missed call and five texts from Allison wanting to know if she made it home safe, each message increasing in franticness, with the final one threatening to send one of the boys looking for her if she doesn't respond. She goes to type out a reply that she's all okay before pausing - _is_ she okay? 

"Looks like someone really wants to get hold of you," Quentin notes, unashamedly looking at her screen. 

"It's just my sister," Vanya says, firing off a quick _all good_ response and pocketing her phone again, quickly. 

"You got a lot of siblings?" 

"Enough," she responds, warily. "But our dad wasn't exactly... he wasn't a great dad. So in many ways, it feels like I grew up alone." 

"I hear you," Quentin mutters, so quietly that Vanya is unsure if he's speaking to her or himself. 

"You're an only child?" she asks. 

"In practice," Quentin says, vaguely. "You asked how I got into the Commission? I made a deal. Fifty years of service and I get to retire to whatever time period I like." 

"Huh," Vanya says. She hadn't expected him to actually share something so personal with her. "Do you know which time period you want to go to?" 

"Yes." 

"You must really want to be there, for fifty years of service?" 

"I do," he says. There's a brief moment of silence as Vanya waits for him to elaborate. When it becomes apparent that he's unwilling to offer up any additional information, she racks her brains for something else to say. 

"How long are you here for?" she asks. 

"Just tonight. Leaving tomorrow morning." 

"Who's your mark?" Immediately, he chuckles scornfully. Well, it had been worth a shot. 

"You expect me to tell you that? I thought you were familiar with the Commission?" he scoffs. 

"I was just asking," Vanya says, defensively. He looks at her again, once again seeming to scrutinise every detail about her. She fidgets uncomfortably. 

"You're worried it's you?" he asks. Vanya feels herself flush again. "Is that why you're talking to me? You're trying to find out about my assignment?" He presses, but his tone isn't angry. On the contrary, he seems delighted. 

"Yes... I mean, no..." Vanya begins, flustered. "... is it me?" Her stammered response only seems to make him happier. 

"Like I said, you really expect me to tell you?" he asks, an infuriating smile plastered across his smug face. 

"I feel like I have the right to know!" Vanya protests. 

"What sort of assassin tells their mark they're going to kill them?" Quentin demands. 

"A confident one?" Vanya shoots back. He considers. 

"Alright, fair point," he concedes. "But that's not why I'm not going to tell you."

"Well, why then?" she huffs. 

"Because if I tell you, there's a chance you'll stop talking to me," he replies. "And I don't want that." Vanya doesn't know what to say to that. She searches his face for any signs of teasing, and while he's still smiling, he seems completely serious.

"Well, you're definitely not ex-Commission," he chuckles. "Even our most incompetent agent wouldn't screw up an intelligence operation this badly." 

"Maybe that's what I want you to think," Vanya points out. "Maybe this is all part of my master plan." He quirks an eyebrow. 

"Is it?" he asks. In response, Vanya takes another gulp of coffee, trying to look aloof. It doesn't work. 

"Like an open book!" he crows, happily. 

"Alright, alright," Vanya grumbles. "Sorry I'm not some super assassin." 

"No, no, don't apologise," he tells her. "The honesty is refreshing. Although," once again, he leans in, but closer this time - close enough that his breath tickles her neck and Vanya's skin immediately breaks out in goosebumps. "I'd be happy to teach you some tricks of the trade... if you want?" Vanya's mouth instantly goes dry. She doesn't find him unattractive, particularly when he smiles. Particularly with the way he's looking at her. 

"Who's being obvious now?" she asks, hoping her voice doesn't sound too hoarse. Quentin grins, his eyes flickering down to her lips. 

"I wasn't trying to be subtle," he tells her. Vanya feels butterflies erupt in her stomach, but he pulls back before she can respond, though he keeps an arm slung around the back of her chair, one of his fingers lightly stroking the exposed skin of her shoulder. 

The conversation flows freely and easily. They skate around more serious questions about their background or the Commission and stick firmly to topics relating to their interests. They have a good-natured debate on whether _Macbeth_ or _Much Ado About Nothing_ is Shakespeare's greatest play. Vanya enjoys that he actually seems interested in hearing why Vivaldi's _Spring_ is her favourite piece to play on the violin, and is surprised to hear that he enjoys the work of Henri Vieuxtemps. He in turn seems impressed that she can actually follow along with his explanation of how he would solve the Riemann Hypothesis, and even actively engage with some of the points he makes. 

They talk until the waitress kicks them out, muttering under breath that "some of us have homes to go to". They trudge along the street as slowly as they can, trying to prolong the conversation for as long as possible. 

"Where are you staying?" Vanya asks, eventually. 

"I don't know yet," he says. 

"Ah," she pauses, trying to decide how to best phrase her next question. She decides to just take the plunge. "Listen. I know a hotel nearby. It's pretty cheap and the rooms are clean. If you want, we can go there... like, together?" 

Quentin stops abruptly. 

"You mean, spend the night together?" he asks, carefully. 

"Yeah," Vanya says, weaving her fingers in and out of each other. "Only if you want, though." 

"What happened to being worried I was going to assassinate you?" he drawls. At this point, she's fairly certain that he's _not_ going to kill her, but she plays along. 

"Would it make any difference whether I was with you or not?" she asks. 

"No," he says, and she believes him. 

"Well then," she shrugs. He stays still, just looking at her. His gaze weighs heavily on her, and she begins to regret having ever asked. 

"Listen, don't worry about it," she says after a few moments, desperate to leave so she can go home, bury herself under a heap of blankets and wallow in her own embarrassment. "It was a stupid idea. I hope everything goes well with your assignment. Have a good night." 

With that, she turns, walking off as speedily as her shoes will allow, mentally berating herself. No doubt everyone at the Commission will get a good laugh from this. 

Then suddenly, he's in front of her. 

She's so surprised that she almost walks into him. She didn't hear him run after her, let alone overtake her, but before she can question it, he reaches down and tucks her hair behind her ear, his ink-stained fingertips lingering on her cheek. 

"Where's this hotel?" he asks, softly. Vanya feels as if her heart has both stopped beating and has started beating far too quickly. 

"This way," she says, but doesn't move. He nods, his hand flattening against her cheek to gently cup her face. He bends down painfully slowly, as if she's a small bird and he's worried that any sudden movement will scare her away. 

"You're sure?" he murmurs, inches away from her lips. In response, Vanya knots her hands in the lapels of his blazer and pulls him down towards her. His stubble gently scratches her skin, his lips are rough and dry, and his mouth tastes of coffee and bourbon. Vanya doesn't care. He kisses her like he can't get enough, his arms wrapping tightly around her, the feel of his hands tortuously intimate through the thin fabric of her dress, as he pulls her closer towards him. 

She barely remembers how they get to the hotel. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Song inspiration for this chapter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiuZNVSSRwE)


	3. Interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super (pleasantly) surprised by the positive response to this fic! Thank you so much to everyone reading, leaving kudos and commenting! ❤
> 
> Also, I gotta be honest, this fic would probably be a lot shorter if I cut out the sibling interactions but I couldn't bring myself to do that, so I'm really glad to see that you guys have also enjoyed reading the Hargreeves banter! Expect a fair amount more of that in this chapter! 😊

He's gone in the morning. 

Vanya wakes up to rumpled sheets, an empty bed and a solitary note on the bedside table: 

_Check out is 12. Bill is paid. Q_

There's a scribble at the end of it, as if he had meant to write more but then decided against it. Other than the note, the room bears no evidence that he had ever been there at all. Her clothes are still strewn across the floor, having been hastily abandoned on the way to the bed, neither of them willing to waste even a second with their hands not on each other. However, where his clothes had been intertangled with hers, there's now only bare carpet, and his briefcase is nowhere to be seen.

Vanya sighs and collapses back into the sheets. She's not surprised, but she is disappointed. 

She wonders how long ago he left, if he snuck out before the first rays of sunlight had filtered in through the window or if she has only just missed him. Did he take his time, purposefully showering and getting dressed as slowly as he could, hoping in spite of himself that she would wake up and convince him to stay? Or did he just leave immediately, finding a quick exit much easier and less painful than lingering and being reminded of what he could not have? 

She rubs her eyes, trying to process how she's feeling. Isn't it better this way, really? After all, he's an assassin working for an organisation that maintains the balance of space and time - it's not like he's in any position to offer her a stable relationship. They had only been each other's for the night and not a moment longer. 

And yet... he had touched her so tenderly, as if he had really cared about her experience as much as his own, and had looked at her so reverently, like he couldn't believe she was here doing this with him and was trying to document as much of her as possible to take with him. It had all felt undeniably intimate and definitely not how she had expected the night to go. But then again, it isn't as if she's had many one-night stands... maybe this is how it's meant to feel afterwards? 

She glances at the note again. All the same, he could've been a little less clinical about it.

Her phone buzzes and she reaches to check it - before springing out of the bed, nearly crashing to the floor as legs get tangled in the slippery hotel sheets. It's already eleven, meaning she only has one hour before she's due at the apartment viewing with Allison, which, considering she's naked in a hotel room on the opposite side of the city from her apartment, is not nearly enough time. 

Somehow, she manages to zip herself back into her dress and only winces slightly when she straps her tender feet back into her heels, wishing that she had Five's power so she could jump to her apartment and get changed. She washes her face with cold water and the complimentary sachet of soap to get her remaining make-up off, scrubbing so hard that her skin turns slightly pink. 

Trying to walk with the confidence of someone who has chosen their outfit on purpose and not by necessity, she makes her way out of her room and into the lobby. The mornings are slightly chillier than the balmy evenings, and Vanya shivers a little; she'll have to borrow a jacket from Allison, as well as a pair of sneakers, if she can. Luckily, it doesn't take long to hail a cab and she heads straight to the Mansion, praying that Allison, or even Luther or Diego, answers the door. 

"Well, well, well," Klaus greets her, flinging the door open. He's wearing a short, black robe that barely covers anything - and yet Vanya still feels like she's the exposed one. "Have a good night, did we?" 

"Isn't it a bit early for you to be up?" Vanya asks, deliberately avoiding the question as she pushes past him into the house. 

"Can't get up early if you don't sleep - though by the looks of you, you should know all about that," he comments, undeterred, closing the door and following her down the hall. 

"Actually, I slept very well," Vanya tells him. It's not exactly a lie. 

"I'll bet," Klaus winks at her. "Come on, spill the beans!" 

"There's really nothing to tell," Vanya insists, flushing furiously. 

"Oh _spare me_ , do you really think I don't know a walk of shame when I see one?" Klaus scoffs. "If my artistry got you laid, then I, as the proud artist, have a right to know!" 

"Klaus, I _swear_ -"

"What's going on in here?" a voice demands. Vanya groans as Luther barrels into the hallway, his arms flexed, ready to confront danger head-on. Diego follows a few steps behind him, munching on a bowl of cereal and visibly less concerned. Luther's eyes dart around for any potential threats, but when he sees that it's just Vanya, and not some masked assailant or one of Klaus' jilted yet persistent lovers, he relaxes. "Oh hey, Vanya... weren't you wearing that dress last night?" 

"Nothing gets by you, eh big guy?" Klaus asks, dryly. He comes up next to Vanya and flings an arm around her. "Our little Vanny bought a first-class ticket to pound town last night!" 

"Oh god, come _on_ , I'm eating!" Diego protests, while Luther shuffles, unsure what to do with this information. 

"No, no, no!" Vanya protests, shrugging off Klaus' arm. "I just fell asleep in my clothes and woke up too late to change before I needed to meet Allison. _That's all_." She glares at him, hoping the conviction in her tone will cover up for the weakness of her story. It does not.

"Vanya, sweetheart, your lips are saying one thing, but everything else," Klaus gestures to her overall appearance. "Is saying the complete opposite." He reaches over and runs a single, long finger through her tangled hair. "Exhibit A, you have an absolutely dire case of bedhead and..." he steps forward and inhales dramatically. "Exhibit B, you absolutely _reek_ of sex. And don't even get me started on Exhibit C - the dress," he smirks, his expression unbearably smug. "The evidence is clear - you danced the no pants dance!" 

Vanya jerks away from him and turns to Diego, who looks just as unhappy with the conversation as she feels. 

"You know, if you were ever gonna stab him, _now_ would be the time," she comments. 

"Maybe we should all just move on," Luther says hastily, as Diego's spoon twitches in his fingers. 

"Sure, no problem! I just have one question," Klaus says. He stands in front of Vanya and folds his arms, levying her with a stern look that lasts all of a few seconds before it crumbles into a goofy grin. "Who's the lucky guy, gal or non-binary pal? Ow!" he yelps as Diego cuffs him up the side of the head. 

"Quit harassing her," he growls. 

"What's wrong with taking a healthy interest in my sister's sex life?" Klaus demands. 

"How about you repeat that sentence back to yourself a couple of times and you might figure it out," Diego tells him. With Klaus distracted, Luther catches Vanya's eye and gestures for her to make her escape. As quietly as she can, Vanya slips past her bickering brothers, Luther's big body moving to block the path to her once she's in the clear. Vanya smiles at him appreciatively; he's really not a bad guy. 

She retreats to the safety of kitchen, the sounds of Klaus loudly defending his actions to an increasingly exasperated Diego echoing in the corridor behind her. Five is already there in his normal spot in front of the coffee maker, standing with his back to her as he pours himself a cup from a freshly brewed batch. She makes a beeline for him. 

"Hi Five," she says, plucking the cup out of his hand. Five immediately stiffens, but sighs when he realises who it is and lets her take it with minimal resistance. If any other sibling had tried to take his coffee, they would have found themselves jumped to the top of a random skyscraper and left there. Not her, though. 

"Vanya," he greets her, reaching for a fresh cup. Normally, Five takes great care in his appearance: slicking down his hair, meticulously ironing the slightest creases out of his shirts, and making sure his tie is pin straight at all times. Now, however, his hair sticks up at all angles from repeatedly running his hands through it, his uniform is rumpled, and there are dark circles under his bloodshot eyes that match the ink stains spattering his hands. He may be in a teenage body, but he looks far more tired than any teenager would have a right to.

"Did you get any sleep at all last night?" Vanya asks, despite already knowing the answer.

"No time for sleep," is the predictable reply. "Not when I'm _this_ close."

"You'll get there," she assures him. "You have time." 

"I just feel like there's something I'm not seeing," he tells her, the frustration evident in his voice. "Like it's right in front of me and I just can't -" He turns to face her properly and stops. "What are you wearing?" 

"Uh, it's that dress that Klaus and Allison put me in yesterday," Vanya admits, a little reluctantly. For some reason that she can't quite pinpoint, she would rather sit through an onslaught of Klaus' unashamed and intrusive questions than tell Five about her night. 

"You wore that last night?" 

"Yes."

"And you're still wearing it now?" 

"Yes."

"Hmm," he says, his eyebrows knitting together in a frown as he considers her. Five has always had the ability to analyse someone with a single look, as if he can see _through_ them to whatever they're thinking, even if they're telling him something completely different. He's so difficult to lie to that when they had been younger, Vanya had once overheard her siblings discussing whether he could read minds as well as teleport. Vanya has a lot more affection and tolerance for the more disconcerting aspects of Five's personality than most people - but though she's been on the receiving end of his looks multiple times before, there's something... _different_ to it now and she's not sure why. In Five's own words, it's as if there's something right in front of her, hiding in plain sight, yet she just can't make it out. 

She's extremely grateful when their uncomfortable silence is shattered by Allison bursting into the kitchen. 

"Vanya!" she declares, her eyes wide. "Did you hear?" 

"Hear what?" Vanya asks, warily. 

"Ronald Stump! He's been assassinated," Allison says. Vanya coughs abruptly, fumbling her coffee cup and causing hot coffee to splash on her hands and the floor. She ignores it. 

"Really?" she croaks out. 

"Yeah - he's was found in his penthouse this morning! They think he was taken out by a sniper," Allison says, far too wrapped up in the story to notice her sister's response. "Apparently the aim was excellent. If it had been a knife, I would've thought it was Diego on one of his vigilante crusades. But no suspects yet." Vanya nods, slowly processing the information. 

"Ah... well, that's... that's..." she says, her brain struggling to figure out the appropriate reaction. 

"You don't seem too surprised by the news," Five notes, coolly. 

"Well, I mean, Stump _was_ one of the most powerful men in New York, right? Isn't assassination just an occupational hazard?" she shrugs, avoiding looking him in the eye. Five hmms again, planting his hands in his pockets. His expression is unreadable, but Vanya can practically feel the scepticism radiating off him. 

"Right," Allison agrees, still completely oblivious to the secondary exchange happening in front of her. "It's just so weird - we literally met him last night..." she trails off, a smile spreading across her face as she finally registers Vanya's appearance. "Speaking of last night, looks like you had a fun time," she notes, approvingly. "So _this_ is why it took you forever to text me back, huh?"

"Can we please talk about this later?" Vanya asks, desperately. Fortunately for her, Allison's social skills far supersede her brothers'. 

"Sure," she agrees. "But we _will_ talk about it." 

"Thank you," Vanya says, relieved. She takes a gulp of coffee to ground herself. "By the way, can I borrow a jacket and some sneakers? My feet feel like they're going to fall off, and I don't want to turn up to the new apartment looking like this." 

"Of course - but you know you have time to go home and get changed, right? The viewing's not for a couple of hours," Allison replies, bemused. Vanya frowns. 

"I thought it was at twelve?" she asks. 

"Nope, it's at two," Allison says. "Wow, you really _did_ have a busy night." Vanya feels her cheeks burn. 

"I'll go home and get changed," she mutters, pressing her coffee cup into Allison's hands and near fleeing the kitchen. 

"Okay, but traffic is going to be a nightmare now that news of the assassination is public," Allison calls after her. "Why not ask Five to jump you -"

"No!" Vanya yelps. "I mean, no it's okay," she corrects herself, backtracking furiously. "I could use the fresh air." 

"Yup, cos we got plenty of that in New York," Allison says, wryly. Vanya doesn't stop to reply; it turns out that running in heels is easy when you're motivated enough. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do have the fourth chapter already written out ~~in comic sans in a word document~~ , but I need to edit and change a few things before posting. All the same, I'll definitely try and get it done as quickly as I can 😊
> 
> Hope you're all staying safe! 
> 
> [Song inspiration for this chapter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03ChzPHHWIQ)


	4. Act II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, after _a lot_ of editing, here it is! Once again, I've really been blown away by your enthusiasm and support! ❤ Some of you had ideas in the comments that were far more creative than the ones I had thought up for this story line (the initial draft didn't include the opening part from Five's POV, but I wrote it in since so many of you were excited to see his reaction to the ball finally dropping).
> 
> Still, I really hope you all enjoy this absolutely final chapter ******!
> 
> (Also, lads, while I was working on this, I also had to battle an army of [these bastards](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crane_fly), who decided that it was the perfect time to invade en masse. Little buggers.)

Five knows he's clever. More than clever, even. One of the things that makes him so clever is his ability to hold two ideas in his head at the same time, no matter how different or contradictory they are. It had particularly come in handy in his work as an assassin, since he often had to separate what he did from what he thought about doing it. Sometimes it wasn't enough to just separate them; he would have to actively _not think_ as he pulled the trigger, just to be absolutely sure that he didn't miss his mark. 

As he watches Vanya leave the kitchen, flustered and embarrassed, part of his mind is still mulling over the equation that he had been working on before coming to refill his coffee, while the other part is battling with the nagging feeling that he's missed something significant. 

She had looked beautiful, but that in itself hadn't made him so unsettled; Five has never needed Klaus' makeover skills to find Vanya attractive. No, it had been the intense feeling of déjà vu that had hit him the second he had turned around and seen her in that dress. As a time-traveller, Five finds déjà vu extremely unnerving at the best of times. It's like standing in a field he's been in multiple times before, except there's a thick layer of fog making the scenery strange and unrecognisable. He may be inches away from safety or he may be just about to step over a cliff edge, and there's no way to know. _Unexpected_ déjà vu instantly puts him on guard - especially as it involves Vanya. 

Ronald Stump is also significant, even if only in name; Five can't give less of a shit about Stump as a person if he tries. Yet, when Allison had announced his assassination, it hadn't been new information to him and he's certain that he somehow must have known about it already. However, this only leads to more questions, namely how the fuck is Stump's assassination connected to Vanya's dress? Unless he's having déjà vu about two different things at the same time. Which is possible but would be extremely annoying. 

Taking care not to drop his thoughts on the equation, Five sips his coffee and wracks the free part of his brain, systematically sorting through his memories - not an easy thing to do when you've crossed timelines. But just when he thinks he's honing in on the answer, Allison comes back into the room. 

"What do you think that was all about?" she asks, disrupting his train of thought entirely. 

"What?" Five snaps.

"Vanya," Allison says, unfazed by his rudeness. "I mean, it's pretty obvious she got laid." If she says anything else, Five doesn't hear her. The image of Vanya moaning as her dress is tugged urgently yet carefully over her head dominates his mind, pushing any other thoughts completely out of his head. He blinks, taken aback by how immediately and vividly the image came to him, momentarily paralysed by the force of it. "Five? Hello?" Allison calls, waving a head in front of his face. "You okay? You kinda zoned out there." 

"I'm fine," he says, brusquely, shaking his head slightly as if to physically clear his mind of Vanya hot yet shivering under someone else's touch. He prepares to jump to his room, ready to lose himself in his equations and forget the whole morning...

... and freezes. 

He's not imagining Vanya doing those things. _He's remembering it_. 

That revelation is all that's needed for the fog to clear, memories immediately slotting neatly into place like pieces in a jigsaw. He turns to Allison, who's looking at him with wide eyes full of concern. 

"Fuck."

**xXx**

As Allison had predicted, in the short period of time it had taken for Ronald Stump's assassination to become public knowledge, the city has become near gridlocked, and it takes Vanya over an hour to make the twenty-minute journey back to her apartment. She bursts through the door, kicks off her shoes and wrenches her dress over her head, unable to stop and properly enjoy being free of them before jumping in the shower. 

It's possibly the speediest shower of her life yet it's not nearly quick enough, and when she's finished, she's extremely low on time. She grabs some clothes left abandoned on a nearby chair without bothering to check how clean they are, hauls on the jeans and is just pulling the shirt down over her stomach when there's a _crack_ and Five appears in a burst of blue light. 

"Vanya, I need to talk to you," he says immediately. He looks like he's also cleaned up: his uniform is neat and his hair is combed, though his face still bears the tell-tale marks of insufficient sleep. 

"Not now Five," she rebuffs him, pushing past him out of her room. She'll lecture him on personal boundaries and the importance of knocking later. 

"It's important," he insists, following her. 

"If it's another apocalypse, it can wait until this evening," Vanya says firmly, shoving her feet into blissfully soft sneakers. 

"Vanya, _please_." That slows her down; Five barks orders, he rarely makes requests, let alone says please. He looks at her imploringly, his normally arrogant expression replaced by one of uncharacteristic concern. If he had shown up looking like this at any other time, Vanya would have been alarmed. 

"Listen, Five, I promise we'll talk later," she says, more gently. "But I really need to go, I'm gonna be late to meet Allison." She shoots him a reassuring smile and yanks open her door, stepping into the stairwell.

" _Viola_." 

Time stops. Vanya's head empties, leaving her light and adrift, as if the slightest breeze would be enough to carry her away. Only the smooth metal of the door handle under her palm and the hardness of the concrete under her foot hold her in place, anchoring her to the moment. With considerable effort, she forces her body to turn and face him. 

"What did you call me?" she asks, quietly. Five shuffles, for once looking as old as the thirteen-year-old body he's stuck in, before hesitantly clearing his throat. 

"It was the dress," he says. "I knew I had seen that dress before... that I had seen _you_ wear it before..." he trails off, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand. "And then I figured it out. What must have happened." 

"What are you talking about?" she asks, even as a shiver runs down her spine despite the warm weight of her hair on her neck, signalling that she already knows.

His silence only confirms her suspicions. 

" _You're_ Quentin?" she demands. "You?" It sounds so ridiculous that just hearing herself say it makes her want to laugh, the corners of her mouth turning upwards a little at her words. She waits for him to grin and tell her that she's too easy to tease, that he knows her too well... like an open book...

"Yes," he says, gently. 

Her smile slips. 

"But you... _we_..." she breaks off, unable to voice the memories flashing in her brain. Five blushes slightly, his ears turning pink. 

"Yes." 

"Did you know who I was?" she asks. "At the time, did you know who I was?"

"I had an idea," he admits. There's a roar of noise building inside Vanya's head and she raises her voice to be heard over it. 

"I just don't understand why you're telling me this now," she says. Five frowns. 

"I told you - I only properly remembered when I saw you in the dress -"

"Right, you just _forgot_ that you had hooked up with your sister," Vanya shoots back, the idea a lot more hurtful than she would care to admit. 

"In case _you_ forgot, I've been a bit busy trying to save everyone's asses from _two_ apocalypses," Five snaps. There's a scoffing edge to his words, the kind he normally adopts when he thinks she's being unnecessarily slow. "Besides, it happened _years_ ago -"

"It happened _yesterday_!" she reminds him sharply. Instantly, his face softens, suitably chastised. 

"I know," is all he says. Vanya stares at him incredulously. She has so many questions, so many things she wants to tell him - but her mind is a churning sea of thoughts and she's struggling to break the surface. She's spent the day trying to convince herself that it's a good thing that Quentin had gone, that it's ridiculous to miss someone she barely knows... only for it to turn out that had known him, and that he had come back... and been standing in front of her all this time. How can he be so calm? Maybe the night hadn't been as significant for him as it had been for her. The thought makes her clutch the door handle tightly, barely noticing as it melts in her grip. The roaring in her head is joined by a low rumbling sound in the room as all the furniture starts to vibrate, knocking against the wooden floorboards. Five glances around, warily. 

"Vanya," he says, taking a step towards her. "Vanya, you need to calm down." Vanya slams the door shut, grimly satisfied when it makes him stops dead in his tracks. 

"Calm down?" she demands, once again almost laughing at the sheer ridiculousness of the words. "Are you fucking kidding me?" 

"You're upset, I get it -"

"Upset? _Upset_? I am a little more than _upset_ , Five!" she yells. The tension of her power builds in her chest, coiling tightly like a spring. She should be angry. She should be furious. And she is - but not at Five and all the things he has neglected to tell her, apocalypse or no. Instead, it's the overwhelming sense of _unfairness_ that he is returned to her like this, in a teenage body with a battle-scarred mind, that has her raging at the universe. But the universe hasn't bothered to send a representative, leaving him the only target for the tsunami of emotions building inside her.

"I understand." He's still trying to be patient, but Vanya can see his patience is fraying fast. She knows that had it been any of their other siblings, he wouldn't have bothered to reign in his temper in this far. It infuriates her all the same. What right does he have to be irritated at _her_? "But if you blow the world up now, then everything we've done will be for nothing." 

"We wouldn't have had to do all that stuff if you had just done your job right in the first place!" Vanya bites back. She knows she's being petulant, that she doesn't even believe what she's saying, not really. She doesn't care.

His eyes darken. 

"Vanya," he begins, warningly. 

" _Stop saying my fucking name_!" There's a low creak as her heavy bookcase is dislodged from its position against the wall, toppling over right where Five is standing - or had been standing. He's gone in an instant and Vanya barely has time to register his arms wrapping tightly around her from behind before blue light flashes before her eyes. For a moment, she's weightless. Then she blinks. 

The ground beneath her feet is no longer worn floorboards but white rock that stretches out as far as she can see, her dingy apartment walls replaced by bright blue skies. Momentarily blinded by the sudden brightness and disoriented from the unexpected jump, Vanya's knees buckle and only Five's hands around her shoulders stop her from collapsing completely. She shakes him off.

"Where the hell are we?" she gasps, stumbling away from him. Five lets her go, his hands in his pockets as he casually looks at their surroundings. 

"The Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah," he says. "Figured it might be best if we have this chat out of New York." He doesn't add _just in case you lose control and decimate the city_ , but Vanya hears it anyway. 

"But I'm meant to be meeting Allison for an apartment viewing!" she protests, fishing her phone out of her pocket. No signal. Of course. 

"Well, we best make this quick then," Five says. Vanya takes a step towards him, her hands balling into fists as her anger reignites inside of her. 

"Take me back," she bites out.

"No," Five says. "Not until you hear me out."

"I'm not fucking around," she growls. To demonstrate, she lets her powers ripple over her skin, setting every nerve alight with a tingling warmth. This isn't the first they've nearly come to blows with their powers. The last time, Vanya had been the one to back down first. She doesn't feel quite as willing to do that now. Five's jaw tightens, but he doesn't rise to the bait. 

"Neither am I," he says. Even in his teenage body, he's a head taller than she is, and he looks her dead in the eye, meeting her gaze evenly. He should be afraid, Vanya thinks. He's seen what she can do. 

"You just can't help yourself, can you?" she sneers. "Inserting yourself into other people's lives, thinking you know better..."

"I'm sorry, should I have just _let_ you destroy the world twice?" Five demands, his exasperation ringing in her ears.

"I'm not talking about the apocalypse, Five!" she rages. Her voice cracks on his name and she mentally kicks herself for not holding it together; Five is an expert at identifying people's weaknesses and exploiting them to his own advantage, she doesn't need to make it any easier for him. However, rather than aiming straight for the chink in her armour, he drops his own haughty facade, his desperation for her to listen to him clear and unfiltered on his face. The unexpected display of vulnerability sends a jolt running through Vanya, her hold on her powers almost slipping. Almost. "How is this even possible?" she asks. "I thought you got stuck in a future where everyone was dead?" 

"I _did_ ," he insists. "But a few years into my contract with the Commission, the Handler thought I needed to be... _incentivised._ So she sent me on a mission to a reality where I had succeeded in stopping the apocalypse. To give me a taste of what the future could be if I kept my head down and did what I was told. A good little assassin." His lips twist into a scornful sneer. 

"You assassinated Ronald Stump," Vanya supplies, and Five nods. "And were you? Incentivised?" She's unable to keep the bitterness out of her words, the idea that Five had only done what he did because _the Handler_ told him to making her stomach churn. 

"Yes - but not in the way she wanted." He peers at her, seeing her inner struggle. "Vanya, I didn't go to the hotel with you because the Handler wanted me to. In fact, I doubt she would've ever given me the assignment if she had known what was going to happen as it definitely didn't work out in her favour. I went because I wanted to."

"Then why didn't you tell me who you were?" she presses. "When you were Quentin?" 

"Couldn't fuck up the timeline," he says, abruptly. 

"Oh," Vanya says. "Right."

"And..." he pauses and closes his eyes, apparently only able to tell her this if he pretends she's not there at all. "I just wanted to be happy with you. Just for a night. Telling you who I was risked finding out that it _wasn't_ you after all - or that you wouldn't want to be with me anymore." His voice is tight, as if he's having to force the words out, but his raw honesty once again catches Vanya off-guard and this time, her powers dissipate. She takes a deep breath, the pressure easing in her chest. 

"You... wanted to be with me?" 

His eyes snap open, emboldened by her words. "Vanya, the _only_ reason I was able to walk out of that hotel room was because if I didn't then that future would never happen, and you would be dead," he tells her, earnestly. His words weigh heavily on her and, without her powers giving her strength, she sits down heavily on the ground. 

"But I thought we were a family," she mumbles, more to herself than anyone else. Five crouches down in front of her and gently tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, and in an instant, Vanya can see the imprint of Quentin's face under his.

"Oh Vanya," he says, with a softness reserved only for her. "We _are_ family. But you've never been a sister to me."

"What am I then?" she asks. 

"Something different. Something more," he says, simply. Vanya stares at him, unsure how to respond. Her lack of a reaction seems to alarm him as he suddenly yanks his hand away from her. "Do you... do you see me as a brother?" he asks, guardedly. Vanya considers, focusing on Quentin's face, which rises out of her memories like a ghost from the grave. She knows for most people, finding out that your one-night stand is your adoptive brother would be horrifying. Yet, the more she thinks about it, the more things seem to make sense. Why she had got on so well with him, why she had felt like there had been a connection beyond that of a typical one-night stand, why she had been so heartbroken when he had gone... 

... he hadn't been a stranger after all. 

He had been Five. 

The image of Quentin's face lingers on top of Five's face in front of her. She doesn't know how she had missed it before. Same cheekbones. Same thick eyebrows. Same smug expression that most people find off-putting but she somehow finds endearing. Same crinkle in the corner of their eyes when teasing her. She had been so happy just to have a family back that she had forgotten she hadn't grown up with Five like she had with her other siblings. If she thinks back to when they were both children together, it's all too clear that her thirteen-year-old self had felt the same way about Five before he had vanished that she does about Quentin now. 

"No," she says. "I mean, it's complicated right now, obviously, but... I didn't see Quentin as a brother. If he had told me... if _you_ had told me... I think I still would've..." she doesn't finish the sentence. She doesn't need to.

Five twitches, a range of emotions flickering over his face, though if they're happiness or frustration, Vanya can't tell. He stands and starts pacing agitatedly, muttering to himself. Vanya lets him do it. Instead of an explosion of power, all her pent-up emotions are released in tears, spilling down her face in noiseless waterfalls. He notices and is instantly back on the floor in front of her. 

"You know, I used to think being alone was the worst," she muses, her voice thick. "But I guess, at least when you're alone, you don't lose people." Five wrinkles his nose. 

"You haven't lost me Vanya," he tells her. The impatient tone is back in his voice, but Vanya finds it oddly comforting: a familiar landmark in unknown territory. 

"Haven't I? You're in your thirteen-year-old body, Five," she says. Five presses his lips into a thin line.

"Really? I hadn't noticed," he barbs back. 

"You know what I mean," Vanya insists. He sighs and sits down on the floor next to her, resting his arms on his knees. 

"Yeah, I do," he agrees. They sit in silence for a while, staring out at the flat, endless landscape of blue and white, and the hazy blur in the middle where they meet. Vanya takes deep, grounding breaths and rubs at her cheeks with her sleeve cuff. 

"I can't remember if I told you," Five says, suddenly. "But you looked beautiful. You always do." Vanya snorts in surprise and glances at him, but he's staring pointedly ahead of him with a carefully set expression - even though his ears have once again turned mildly pink. 

"Thanks," she says, unable to stop herself from smiling. She nudges him with her shoulder. "You didn't look so bad yourself." He grunts in acknowledgement, his hands tightening around his knees and his ears deepening to red. He clears his throat.

"Look," he says. "I really think I'm close to figuring out how to age up out of this body. There's a few calculations I need to iron out... but I will get there." 

"What happens if you don't?" Vanya hiccups. Usually, Five doesn't react well to his mental prowess being questioned, but he merely pauses before cautiously taking her dry hand in his soft one, his fingers caked in ink, hers in callouses. 

"Even in the _very unlikely_ event that I don't," he says. "Every day is a day closer to the man you met last night coming back anyway. That's the slow beauty of ageing."

"But my body would be _sixteen_ years old than yours," Vanya says. 

"My mind is already forty-five years older than yours," he points out. "I don't care, Vanya."

"You would really wait? For me?" she asks, trying to keep her tone casual despite her heart thudding painfully against her rib cage. 

"Like I said, it's very unlikely that I'll have to," he reminds her. "But I've waited this long - not like a few years are gonna make a big difference." 

Vanya bites her lip and doesn't respond. A single cloud drifts across the sky above them, blown by an unfelt breeze. 

"You remember that night on the roof?" she asks, eventually. "When we watched the sunset? I thought you were going to kiss me."

"I was thinking about it," Five admits. He looks at her out of the corner of his eye. "Would you have minded if I had?" 

"No," Vanya says. "But I think it would've made your disappearance much harder. And it was already pretty hard." His grip on her hand tightens a little. 

"I'm sorry," he murmurs. She's not exactly sure whether he's apologising for sixteen years ago or last night - but it doesn't matter either way. 

"It's okay," she tells him, squeezing his hand back. "Really."

He turns to face her properly then. In the light, he looks both extremely young and impossibly old, an equally indiscernible expression on his face. Slowly, he leans forward and presses his forehead gently to hers. Vanya is overwhelmed by the flood of emotions surging back to her after sixteen years, and feels tears once again pricking at the corners of her eyes. She fights them, clutching his hand like it's a life raft. 

Things are undeniably, impossibly _complicated_ , and trying to make sense of it all leads to nothing but a bittersweet taste in her mouth and an ache in chest. But, despite still being very much separated from each other in some ways, at least they're both in this mess together. At least she's really not alone anymore.

Vanya sighs as the last remaining twinges from the deep-rooted pain of a childhood spent in isolation are completely soothed, leaving her with a sense of _peace_ for the first time in her life.

"One face, one voice, one habit and two persons," she whispers. 

"A natural perspective that is and is not," Five finishes. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ****** ~~Fuck, I'm going to end up writing an epilogue, aren't I?~~  
> 
> 
> [Song inspiration for this chapter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2olx49egxYg)


	5. Encore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here we are - four months later and I've finally written the epilogue. Sorry it took so long - life suddenly got a bit hectic! But I knew people were dying to find out if Allison and Vanya managed to find a flat in the current housing market so I sat down after Christmas Eve dinner and forced myself to ignore my family and finish it (and as someone who has just gone through the process of moving within a big city, I can honestly say that my experience could not be more different from Allison and Vanya's!). 
> 
> Thank you so much to everyone who commented on this story and left kudos! I'm so happy that you've all enjoyed this fic ~~and hopefully I haven't fucked that up now with this epilogue!~~

Vanya has never been good at navigating relationships. The trauma from a childhood kept at enough of a distance to be isolated yet close enough to know what she was missing has left her craving contact with other people yet extremely unsure as to how to go about it. She knows how relationships work in theory; she just needs a manual that explains the actual mechanics of it all. Not that she supposes a manual would help her much, considering her track record. It's extremely unlikely there would be a chapter on how to deal with a narcissistic boyfriend who was manipulating her to get back at her father. Or an appendix listing the potential pitfalls of falling in love with a woman who was both a) married and b) from a different time period. 

She absolutely doubts that there would be a paragraph dedicated to explaining why her sort-of brother is avoiding her after they had poured out their hearts to each other in the middle of a desert in Utah. 

And yet, that is exactly the question that Vanya desperately needs an answer to. 

"Watch it, Van!" Diego grunts, bumping into her back slightly and knocking her out of her thoughts, sweat visibly streaming down his forehead as he strains under the weight of the box he's carrying. 

"Oh, sorry!" she says, scooting quickly to one side to get out his way. 

"You alright Vanya? Thinking about how you're going to miss not being surrounded by us big, strong men once you move into your new apartment?" Klaus asks, following Diego into the living room, a single bag swinging freely from his arm. Vanya sighs theatrically and elbows him in his skinny ribs as he passes. 

"Shut up," she tells him, even as a small smile rebelliously tugs at the corners of her mouth. 

"Shut up? _Shut up_?" Klaus repeats in mock outrage. "Diego, did you hear what _your_ sister said to me? After all the heavy lifting we're doing for her?" 

"Shut up, Klaus," Diego groans, carefully lowering the box down before straightening up again, his back cracking loudly. 

When Five had finally jumped Vanya back to the Hargreeves Mansion, a white layer of dust greying her dark hair and her skin slightly pinker from the sun, Allison hadn't allowed her to utter one word before immediately dragging her back out the door. One of the people she had met at the fundraiser apparently knew someone who knew someone else who had just finished renovating an old red brick apartment in The Village but hadn't managed to secure any tenants yet. It had taken Allison the best part of the day to track them down, but once she had done, it had only taken her five minutes to get them to agree to a viewing - and she hadn't even used her rumour. 

The Village is either a five-minute subway ride or a twenty-five-minute walk away from the Hargreeves Mansion, making it close but not too close. The building is only five stories high and doesn't have an elevator, but the apartment is on the third floor, which is high enough to be safely removed from the city streets yet not so high that they'd exhaust themselves in the stairwell every day. It isn't the biggest place they have looked at but it's still plenty big enough for the pair of them, with two modest-sized bedrooms, a decent bathroom, and an open concept kitchen and living room that makes the space seem much bigger than it is. Besides, at the rental rates that Allison had managed to haggle the owner down to, it would basically have been a crime for them _not_ to have taken it. 

With an apartment finally secured, the only left for them to do had been to lease out Vanya's flat, which, thanks to New York real estate, had found new renters in practically no time at all. In fact, it had all happened so quickly that Vanya had ended up with an extra day between when she had needed to be out of her old apartment and when they could move into the new one. Luckily, her brothers had instantly agreed to her storing her things in the Hargreeves Mansion for the night and had even insisted on helping her move... an offer they now seem to be regretting.

"Whew! Well I am exhausted!" Klaus declares, flinging the bag carelessly into the growing mountain of her stuff and collapsing into one of the few chairs available - incidentally, one of Vanya's. Diego glares at him, but before he can respond, Luther enters the room, carrying a box under each of his humungous arms as easily as if they had been filled with feathers. Immediately, Diego straightens a little, wiping the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. The brothers may have put a lot of their old animosity behind them, but clearly old habits die hard. 

"This is the last of them," Luther tells her, setting them down. "I'll go take the truck back." 

"Great, thanks Luther," Vanya says. 

" _I'll_ drive," Diego cuts in. "It's a rental, and you broke the steering wheel off the last car you drove." 

"That was _one_ time!" Luther protests. "And I've already told you, there was a swan in the road!" 

" _Suuure_ there was..."

They leave together, bickering good-naturedly. Vanya steps forwards and drags the boxes that Luther had brought in further into the living room so that no one would accidentally trip over them. They're a lot heavier than she had anticipated and she racks her brains trying to remember what she had packed in them. Vanya has never considered herself to have a lot of stuff, particularly in relation to the size of her old apartment, which had always seemed cavernous and echoey. Seeing it all crowded haphazardly into one room however, like old monuments in a forlorn graveyard, makes her feel like it's far too much. She straightens, her breathing slightly heavier, and her eyes fall on the stairs that lead up to the second floor... to Five. 

It's been two weeks since the desert. Two weeks since everything changed between them... not that anything feels particularly different, as she hasn't seen him since then. Based on what her siblings have told her, he hasn’t left his room once, not even for his usual coffee – or at least, if he has then he’s been choosing his movements very carefully, as they haven’t seen him. At first, they had tried going in to convince Five to take a break and eat something. But since Klaus had taken Five breakfast and emerged with a piece of toast stuck to his face and a fried-egg sunny side up on his head, they had all stuck to a strict "no entry" policy and just left plates of food on the floor outside his door. The only signs that he’s in there at all are the empty plates they collect later and the constant scratching sounds of him writing on the walls, which only stop to be replaced by the heavy thuds of him pacing the floor. 

Vanya is desperately worried yet has no idea what to do about it. 

"You could always go and knock, you know?" Klaus doesn't speak loudly, but Vanya jumps all the same, whirling around to see him watching her intently, his eyes bright. It's an unsettling reminder that while he may enjoy playing the fool, that doesn't mean that he is one. 

"Uhh, it's okay, I don't think he wants to be disturbed," Vanya says, opening a box and needlessly rooting around inside. Her long hair falls over her face, hiding the flush she can feel creeping up her neck and to her cheeks. 

"If anyone was to disturb him, I'm sure he wouldn't mind it being you," Klaus replies, his knowing grin almost audible in his voice. 

"What's that supposed to mean?" Vanya asks, trying to sound defiant even as the words come out wobbly and unconvincing. 

"You know what it means," Klaus says. Vanya stares into the box, her tongue sticking to the roof of her mouth, rendering her unable to respond. Klaus seems to take pity on her however, as he suddenly springs to his feet. "Fine, fine! I guess it's my turn to try and get the little shit to eat something," he grimaces. "If I die, don't you dare put any fucking lilies on my grave. I want gardenias. Red ones." 

**xXx**

"Damn Luther, when did you learn to cook?" Diego demands, mopping up the last of his stew with a slice of bread and stuffing the entire thing into his mouth. "Fif if _fo_ fuf!" he says, mouth full, spraying the table with crumbs. 

"Ew, for god's sake Diego, didn't Mom ever tell you to finish your damn mouthful before speaking," Allison says, throwing her napkin at him. 

"This really was delicious Luther," Vanya says. 

"I agree," Klaus declares, stretching back in his chair, rubbing the slight bump in his normally flat stomach contentedly. Luther shuffles a little in his chair, his ears turning as pink as the apron he's still wearing, the seams gaping as it strains against his vast chest. 

"Thanks," he mutters. "I... uh... watched a lot of cooking videos on the moon." 

"Did you cook a lot on the moon?" Vanya asks.

"No, but uh... sometimes I enjoyed pretending," Luther admits, his big shoulders hulking up around his ears, as he tries to sink into himself. "Made eating the same protein shakes every day a little easier." Allison reaches over and places a reassuring hand on his arm. "So," he says, clearing his throat. "I suppose we should take a plate to Five." There's a slight pause. 

"Shotgun, not me!" all of them chorus - except for Vanya, who's left blinking stupidly, wondering what just happened. 

"I don't get it," she says. 

"Sorry, V," Klaus says, not sounding sorry at all, as Luther gets up and ladles a load of strew into another plate. "The rules of shotgun are clear. You get the honour of taking the grumpy old man his dinner." 

"My advice, put the plate on the floor, knock and leave - _quickly_ ," Diego tells her. Vanya looks at each of her siblings in turn and, realising that she's not going to find any allies, accepts her fate. 

"Fine," she mutters, getting reluctantly to her feet and taking the plate from Luther. 

"Godspeed!" Klaus calls after her. "Try not to blow anything up!" Vanya snorts, the sound of her siblings yelling at Klaus to shut up following her out of the room. 

It's autumn now, and twilight comes earlier and earlier each day, deepening the shadows in the Mansion's halls. Vanya walks slowly and convinces herself that she’s only doing so to make sure she doesn't trip and spill anything. Yet sooner than she would like, she finds herself in front of Five's door; a door that had used to always be open to her but now seems firmly and irrevocably shut. There's no sound from within, but she knows he's in there; she can feel his manic energy radiating through the walls. Resignedly, she bends down to set the plate on the floor and her foot knocks into the plate that Klaus had delivered at lunch, the sandwich on it limp and untouched. Vanya sees it and makes a split-second decision. She opens the door.

Five's room has always resembled a mad scientist's lair more than a teenager's bedroom, but anything before was mild compared to the sight that greets her now. Equations cover every square inch of the walls, spilling up onto the ceiling. If they cover the floor too, she's unable to tell, as it's completely carpeted with paper: pages ripped from various book, print outs, scribbled-on notepaper, and everything in-between. 

The air is old and musty, and the only light comes from a small, beside lamp. Vanya's overwhelmed by the desire to turn on the ceiling light and throw open the window. 

In the middle of the mayhem stands Five, his back to the door. If he notices her come in, he doesn't acknowledge her and remains staring at the opposite wall, muttering under his breath.

"Five?" Vanya calls, quietly. Nothing. She creeps a little further into the room and sets the plate down on his dresser, which is similarly overwhelmed by paper. "I brought you dinner." Still nothing. For a second, Vanya considers just leaving him to it... then, out of the corner of her eye, she notices his hand is shaking slightly. Before she can stop herself, she steps forward and gently encases his hand in her own. He jumps at the contact, whirling around and blinking at her mutely. He looks just as chaotic and wild as the room surrounding him: his eyes are red, his face is drawn, and the collar of his shirt is yellowing slightly from sweat. "Take a break," she tells him, softly. For a second, she thinks that he might, as he grips her hand tightly and leans towards her. 

"No time for breaks," he mutters, pulling his hand out of her grip and heading over to an open book, flipping the pages frantically. It's the most interaction they've had in two weeks - and yet the act of him pulling his hand from hers leaves her feeling emptier than before. 

"You need to rest," she says. 

"I'll rest later," is the obstinate reply. 

"But -" 

"Goddammit Vanya," Five snaps, slamming the book shut and rounding on her. "I am _so close_ to figuring how to age out of this body. So. _Fucking_. Close. And if people in this house just left me alone, I would be a lot closer!"

"But we have time!" she pleads with him. "Lots of time!" 

"I don't want _time_ ," he tells her through gritted teeth, his fists balling, his knuckles glowing eerily blue in the low light. "I have had enough _time_. I want _now_." 

"There won't be a _now_ if you work yourself to exhaustion!" Vanya points out. 

"For fuck's sake, Vanya. I survived an apocalypse... I think I'll survive a few days without Luther's cooking," he sneers, looking distastefully at the plate of stew. Vanya shrugs, helplessly. 

"I don't want you to burn yourself out for me," she says, her voice smaller than she would like it to be. Five is unmoved. 

"Ha!" he snorts. "You're seriously telling me you don't want your precious _Quentin_ back?" Vanya knows that he doesn't mean the harshness in his words, that he's exhausted and frustrated and stressed - not to mention caffeine-deprived - but she's taken as much harshness as she can bear from him, and she bristles anyway. 

"Don't put this on me," she warns him. Tension starts to gather between her shoulders, and she folds her arms to keep her chest from feeling like it's closing in on itself. "I didn't ask you to do this!" 

"Don’t be so naïve,” he scoffs. Vanya's hair begins to rise into the air, blown by an unseen breeze that wafts the curtains and sweeps random pieces of paper off the floor. Klaus had only been joking about her blowing up the house - but clearly he had known the risks better than the others had given him credit for. 

"I am trying," she tells him, a quiver in her voice as she fights to keep a lid on the emotions whirling inside her. "To _help_ you." 

"Then get out and leave me alone," Five replies, harshly, snatching a piece of paper out of the air and turning his back on her. Vanya stares at him, shocked. For a moment, she considers exploding the room anyway, just to spite him. 

"You're such a fucking asshole," she says instead, storming out of the room and slamming the door as hard as she can. The bang is loud enough to disrupt her powers, and she feels the tightness uncoil abruptly in her chest as she gulps down air, refusing to cry... not while she's still in earshot of Five. She hopes his papers are at least in a mess. 

**xXx**

Since Klaus has absorbed Vanya's room into his own, she technically doesn't have a room anymore. Allison had offered for Vanya to sleep with her, but given that their childhood beds are purposefully narrow, even for one person, and that Allison's room is packed with her own boxes, there's barely enough space for Allison in her room, let alone Vanya too. 

Which is how Vanya had ended up sandwiched between Klaus and Allison in Klaus' king-sized bed, staring at the ceiling. Klaus' bed is much softer than her own: his mattress is like a cloud compared to her beat-up, second-hand one and she's fairly sure his black satin sheets didn't come from the Goodwill like hers did. Yet, without the scratchiness of the sheets or the lumpiness of the mattress to distract her, her mind keeps drifting back through the stillness of the night to Five just down the hallway. 

It definitely doesn't help that, while Klaus' bed may be king-sized, three people is definitely a crowd. Plus, it turns out that Klaus is a cuddler, which shouldn't be a surprise, given how touchy he is when awake. Normally, Vanya is more likely than any of her siblings to tolerate his clinginess, not complaining when he rests his chin on top of her head, or wriggles his head onto her lap when she's trying to read on the sofa, or randomly pulls her into a tango across the kitchen. However, right now he's plastered against her, a long leg thrown over her stomach, and it's unbearably warm. Vanya supposes that she should just be thankful that they had managed to convince him to wear pyjama bottoms - even if they are also black satin. 

She wriggles slightly, trying to get some breathing room while not disturbing either of her siblings. 

"Are you awake?" Allison's hushed voice floats to her in the darkness. They no longer need to have hushed conversations in the dark lest Reginald hear them awake after light's out, but Vanya whispers back anyway out of habit. 

"Yes, did I wake you?" 

"Hard not to - you're tossing and turning enough to wake the dead," Allison grumbles, good-naturedly. 

"I disagree vehemently," Klaus' voice says near her ear. 

"Jesus!" Vanya jumps. "How long have you been awake?" 

"Oh ages! Have you tried sleeping next to you? It's like trying to cuddle up to a block of wood. No wonder your relationships were such disasters - HEY!" he protests, as Vanya gives him a sudden shove, adding a little power to the push and nearly sending him flying off the bed. 

"Well, since we're all awake..." There's a click as Allison switches on the lava lamp on the floor, bathing the room in an unearthly green light. She sits up and looks down at Vanya. 

"Penny for your thoughts?" she asks. 

"Just thinking how I can't wait to get back into my own bed," Vanya says, shooting a hard look at Klaus. 

"My god, I regret doing anything nice for you ever," he retorts. 

"Right," Allison chuckles. "So, it's nothing to do with whatever happened between you and Five earlier?" Vanya instantly tenses, her gut reaction to deny everything. 

"Nothing happened," she says, unconvincingly. 

"Come on Vanny," Klaus says, resting his head on her shoulder and looking up at her with big eyes. "You can tell us." 

"You can trust us Vanya," Allison adds, gently. Vanya looks at her sister and brother leaning over her, their faces slowly turning from neon green to fuchsia in the light of the lava lamp. She doesn't have to be alone anymore, she reminds herself. She has a family now. 

She closes her eyes and doesn't open them again until she's told them everything. 

"I _knew_ he would grow up hot!" Klaus declares, triumphantly, once she's finished. Allison promptly reaches over and thumps him on the arm. "Ow!" he protests. "Why is it every time I allow women into my bed, I end up getting punched?" he mutters. Allison narrows her eyes, clearly promising another punch, but Vanya smiles at their interaction, the normalcy helping her relax a little. 

"Well, I guess this explains why Five's been even more... _Five_ than usual lately," Allison comments. 

"You don't think..." Vanya begins, hesitantly. "Do you think it's weird?" Much to her surprise, Allison's eyebrows knit together in an expression of mild exasperation. 

"Oh honey, what even is weird in this family?" she asks. 

"And besides, it's not like you're the only one to have a thing for another Hargreeves," Klaus adds. "Let he - or she - who has not had a crush on another sibling in this family cast the first stone!" This declaration is met with a silence as both Vanya and Allison stare at him. "Oh please, like either of you are in a position to judge," he pouts. 

"The point is," Allison says, cutting him off firmly before he can say anything more. "It's not like you grew up with Five really - and even if you had, none of us were raised as siblings. Not really. We were more..." she struggles to find the right word. "Competitors?" 

" _Competitors_ is too kind," Klaus says. "More like, soldiers in some fucked up child army." Neither Allison nor Vanya disagree.

"He's avoiding me," Vanya says, her voice cracking sadly. For a second, there's silence, presumably as Allison and Klaus search for a comforting reply, unable to deny the truth in her words. To her surprise, it's Klaus that speaks first.

"You know, I have a theory," he says, conversationally. "It seems to me that Reginald's parenting was such a specific brand of fucked up that I really believe that only a Hargreeves can truly love another Hargreeves. It's just too much baggage and fuckery for any other poor shit to even begin to understand. And Five is the most Hargreeves of us all. I mean, for Christ's sake, he lived through an apocalypse that _you_ started. In his mind that probably makes you two eternally bonded or some shit." 

"That is... surprisingly insightful," Allison notes, her voice tinged with begrudging admiration. "If extremely depressing - but I agree, he'll come around. Just give him time." 

"Is that what happened whenever you and Luther fought?" Vanya asks, tentatively. Allison's breath audibly catches in her throat, and for a moment Vanya thinks she may have pushed their new-found sibling bond too far. Even Klaus stills against her, curious to know the answer. 

"No," Allison says, eventually. "But then, I was usually the one in the room and he was usually the one knocking."

"Are you... are you saying that I'm the _Luther_ in this situation?" Vanya asks, the words sounding so absurd that the three of them immediately burst out laughing. Klaus pulls Vanya back against him as Allison lies back down, scooting closer to her sister, resting her forehead lightly against hers. She fumbles lightly under the sheets for Vanya's hands, while Klaus threads his long arm over Vanya's waist to embrace Allison too. For a while, the three lie there in the stillness, the ceiling turning from violet to aquamarine over their heads. 

"Hey Klaus," Allison says, suddenly. "What you were saying about not being the only Hargreeves to have a crush on another Hargreeves... Did you...?" 

"A story for another time!" Klaus declares, quickly. "Nighty night!" Allison meets Vanya's eyes, her face crumpled in a mischievous grin. 

"I bet it was Diego," she mock whispers. 

"Are you kidding? It's gotta be Ben," Vanya giggles. 

"I swear to god, this is the _last time_ I ever allow women into my bed," Klaus grumbles.

**xXx**

The moving men arrive at noon the next day. Allison is out at an audition, leaving Vanya to coordinate – a job that mainly involves her trying to distract her well-meaning but ultimately frustrating brothers so that the moving men can do their damn job. 

"You know, we could've helped you move, V," Luther says, watching two men struggle to pick up a box between them that he probably could've lifted with one hand. 

"I know Big Guy," Vanya says, patting his arm, placatingly. "But it was Allison who hired them, not me." Luther grunts, but doesn't look any less unimpressed. 

"Hey! Watch that, it's fragile!" Diego yells, near chasing a guy carrying a lamp from the living room. "Break it and I'll break you!" 

"Diego!" Vanya calls, as sternly as she can, moving to intercept him. "I'm sure he knows what he's doing." 

"Doesn't look like it," Diego mutters, glaring at the guy's swiftly retreating back. "I can't believe Allison hired these chumps."

"Oh, I dunno, some of them look pretty qualified to me," Klaus says. He's leaning against the wall and filing his nails, otherwise uninterested in what’s happening, but pauses to watch a man in a tight t-shirt come down the stairs, one of Allison's pot plants tucked under each muscular arm. 

Vanya doesn't even reply to that; she can feel a headache slowly start to form between her eyes. She's saved however from any further intervention by the Head Mover approaching her. 

"Ms Hargreeves? We're just about packed if you're ready to leave?" he says, nervously eyeing the three men flanking her. 

"Great, that's great!" Vanya says, as reassuringly as she can. 

"Do you want us to take the violin too?" a man asks, sticking his head out the living room, her violin case hanging precariously from one of his fingers. 

"No!" Vanya says, darting forward quickly and taking it from him. "I mean, no, that's fine, I'll come get it later." She sets the case gently on the sofa. Her violin is both the key to her survival and the most expensive thing she owns; she doesn't want to risk it getting damaged or lost in the whirlwind of the move. The man shrugs. 

"Suit yourself," he says. Vanya turns back to the others, but before she can speak, she hears something: a low rumbling sound echoes through the house from somewhere over their heads and the ceiling begins to tremble. 

"Vanya, is that you?" Luther asks. Vanya shakes her head. 

"No," she says. "I don't think so." The rumbling builds into a roar as the shakes become more violent, dust showering down them, the lights flickering wildly. Then, all of a sudden, it stops. As one, all their eyes move in the direction of Five's room. 

"That little shit," Diego curses, vaulting up the steps two at a time, Luther close behind. "He's gonna blow every fuse in this goddamn house."

"Uhh... I'll be outside in a second," Vanya tells the Head Mover, who doesn't need to be told twice and flees the house. "You need me to stay?" she asks Klaus. 

"No, Vanny," Klaus says, shaking his head firmly as he reluctantly goes to follow his brothers. "We can handle this - you go, enjoy your near apartment! Make sure they don't break anything or Allison will lose her shit... and be sure to get that man's number for me!" 

Vanya hesitates, unwilling to go, wanting both to be there for Five and to protect Klaus, Diego and Luther from him. But then the moving van honks its horn outside, and she leaves, casting one final look over her shoulder as she goes.

**xXx**

Vanya doesn't hear anything from any of her brothers for the rest of the day. Not even Klaus, who had convinced Diego to get a phone with the sole intention of creating a group chat and sending them all daily cat gifs. As soon as Allison gets back from her rehearsal though, she doesn't have much time to think as Allison is _much_ better at coordinating than she is, and all Vanya has to do is switch off her brain and do as she's told. 

They allow themselves a thirty-minute break to gulp down some take-out once the movers have left, before starting the mammoth task of actually putting everything away. By the time Vanya collapses into her bed, having lost count of all the boxes she's gone through but with many more still to go, she's too exhausted to get changed into her pyjamas, let alone worry about what's happening at the Hargreeves Mansion. 

It's only when she wakes up the next morning and digs out her phone from under an abandoned pile of sweaters to find zero notifications waiting for her that she starts to panic. She sends a hasty message to the group chat and watches the screen intently for a reply, only half concentrating on getting ready and nearly stabbing herself in the eye with a toothbrush as a result. Just as she realises that she's trying to put her head through the sleeve of her jumper, her phone buzzes. 

**Klaus: All fine here. Sheesh Vanya, calm down, you'd think we were in danger of an apocalypse of something...**

Vanya rolls her eyes, but her exasperation is lessened slightly by her relief... that is until her phone buzzes again. 

**Diego: You should probably come to the Mansion as soon as you can** **.**

**Diego: To get the violin.**

She frowns. Diego rarely participates in the group chat and when he does, it's mostly with reactionary gifs or emojis. She's also fairly sure that the man couldn't write a cryptic message if he tried - Diego's manner is as blunt as his knives are sharp - yet it seems strange that he should suddenly be in such a hurry for her pick up the violin. Vanya knows better than to try and ask for clarification though and concentrates on finishing getting ready as quickly as possible. 

She manages to keep calm all the way through putting on her shoes and jacket, heading out the door and starting the walk to the Mansion. Then, all of a sudden, she's running, her unrest growing with every rhythmic slap of her sneakers pounding against the sidewalk. Fortunately, this is New York and everyone around her is in too much of their own hurry to get somewhere to notice that the streetlights bend towards her as she passes, or that her shoes leave slight grooves in the ground from where they dig in and push off again. 

She rounds the final corner and is relieved to see that the Mansion is at least still standing. She doesn't slow down though, tearing up the steps and barrelling through the doors before finally skidding to a halt in the hallway. 

"Klaus?" she yells. "Diego? Luther?" The only reply she receives is her own voice echoing through the cavernous hallways around her. There's a stitch burning in her side, her heart is thundering in her head, and her breaths are far too quick and shallow, but the powers buzzing around her body fuel her with a nervous energy. With a great effort, she tries to calm herself down and concentrate, listening intently for the slightest sound that something may be wrong. 

Silence.

All the same, Vanya is not reassured, convinced that _something_ has happened even if she doesn't know exactly what, and she's about to tear through the house anyway - until she remembers the violin. 

She finds it exactly where she left it: still in its case on a sofa in the living room. Sure enough, there's a neatly folded piece of paper propped on top of it. There's no name on it but Vanya's certain it's for her and seizes it with trembling hands, expecting a ransom note or worse. Instead, she's confronted with a couple of lines of scribbled handwriting that she struggles to read but recognises instantly as Luther's. 

_Gone to the shops. Took Diego and Klaus. See you later. L_

Vanya crumples the note in her hand, irritation prickling beneath her skin, annoyed both at herself for panicking over nothing and at her brothers for making panic in the first place, however unintentionally. 

Her powers swell with her emotions, growing too big to fit comfortably inside her. She needs a safe outlet - and the sooner she finds it, the less likely she is to accidentally blow something up. 

Quickly, Vanya unclips the violin case and plucks out her violin. She settles the smooth wood into place under her chin and raises her bow, only pausing for a second to decide on the song before starting to play. 

Her powers latch onto the music instantly, eager for an escape. Vanya submits herself to the sensation entirely, more conduit than musician, allowing the sound to pass through her, ferrying all the pent-up energy through her fingers and into the violin bow, where it dissipates harmlessly into the air. Even after she's been safely disarmed and is full of nothing but air and the usual human things, she keeps playing, too committed to finishing the piece that she couldn't stop even if she had wanted to. 

She's so lost in her music that she doesn't notice that another person has entered the room until they speak. 

"Vieuxtemps." The bow screeches abruptly on the final note as Vanya whirls around, her brain refusing to believe what her ears are hearing until her eyes have confirmed it. 

He looks a lot more tired than she remembers him looking the last time she saw him like this, leaning against the doorway a little too heavily for it to be casual. His dark hair falls limply over his forehead and his skin is an ashy grey, but his gaze is just as intense as it normally is. He's also thinner, though that may be due to his clothes; he's wearing what looks like one of Diego's old t-shirts and an old pair of Luther's trousers that are far too big for him. It's a look that even Klaus would struggle to pull off - but Vanya doesn't care. It's him. 

"You did it," she whispers. He grins then, a smile cracking across his face and Vanya's heart swells in her chest. 

"Hi Viola," he says. 

"Hey Quentin." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (I like to think that when Luther said in the note that he took Diego and Klaus with him, he meant it literally because there is no way that Klaus would let Vanya and Five have a private reunion if he had a choice.)
> 
>  **Happy Holidays!** I hope you're all safe and healthy, wherever you are and however you're celebrating! 
> 
> [Song inspiration for this chapter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tb0ld2BKX0A)


End file.
